I think there's something very creepy about taxidermy for this sort of reason. I can understand it for scientific & educational reasons (in a school science lab, for example) but to feel one is somehow "preserving" one's former pet seems macabre. The body is just an empty shell, there's no life, no spirit (and you can take that in either sense - spiritual, or just simply as in "no zest, no spark".)
It reminds me of these sad cases of people who sleep with the body of their deceased partner in the bed or propped up in the living room because they can't bear to be "parted" from them.
Takes all sorts I suppose...